


Season After Season (Same Rhyme, Same Reason)

by merryhouse



Series: Here's Why [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-25 11:40:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/638523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merryhouse/pseuds/merryhouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ten years in the life of Myrcella Baratheon is all the time needed for the War of the Five Kings to wax and wane.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Season After Season (Same Rhyme, Same Reason)

**Author's Note:**

> I was just thinking about: a) what growing up a Lannister might have been like, and b) what could've happened if someone had called Walder Frey out on failing to respond to the summons of his liege lord. Because, come on, playing it off as "Er, yeah, typical Late Lord Frey" was not the greatest of moves. I shunted the timelines along a little bit, so the war drags on for quite some time in this one. Whoops.

 

 

_But then I was young- and it took ten years_

_in the woods to tell that a mushroom_

_stoppers the mouth of a buried corpse, that birds_

_are the uttered thought of trees, that a greying wolf_

_howls the same old song at the moon, year in, year out,_

_season after season, same rhyme, same reason._

  
from **Little Red-Cap** , Carol Ann Duffy

 

* * *

 

Myrcella Baratheon is seven years old when she first realises that, contrary to what she would have her believe, her mother is not always right. Tom, bright eyed and with his elbows precariously close to the dish of peas, doesn't understand why Grandmaester Pycelle corrected him for stating their house words were, "A Lannister always pays their debts". Myrcella, laughing at her younger brother, tells him that they're _Baratheons_ , not Lannisters like grandfather, so their words are "Ours is the _fury_ , and besides, Tom, the Lannister words are _hear me roar_."

 

Tom nods in slow comprehension and Cersei scolds Myrcella and sends her to her room, and she is unsure if it's for speaking out of turn or for refusing to eat the fish on the table because she felt like it was watching her.

 

The next day, when she is sitting in the library with Uncle Stannis, who makes plain that he has no idea what to do with her- but she likes anyway because he talks to her like she is an adult, and is stern and quiet, so unlike her loud, raucous father (who thinks it adorable that sunny Myrcella has taken such a shine to his older, stony brother)- she asks him.

 

"Uncle _Stan_ -nis," she asks carefully, swinging her feet under the desk where they do not yet touch the floor, pronouncing his name with the same careful inflection she has heard Ser Arys use. Her uncle is one of the few people in the castle who doesn’t treat her like she is too small to be taken seriously, and Myrcella always tries her hardest to show him that she is deserving of such treatment. Uncle Stannis tears his eyes from the page he is reading with obvious reluctance, chin held aloft.

 

" _Yes_ , Myrcella?"

 

"Are the Baratheon house words _ours is the fury_?"

 

Uncle Stannis narrows his eyes at her, gazing at her down the point of his nose.

 

"Yes, Myrcella. Surely your septa has taught you that by now? You are, what, seven years old? Too old to be asking such things, perhaps."

 

"I _know_ ," Myrcella says irritably, then- at the look on his face, softer, "I know, Uncle, but last night when I said them at dinner mother got cross with me- well, I don't know if that was because I said the trout was looking at me, or if it was- anyway. Mother says we're Lannisters, but you're a Baratheon and father's your brother, so _I'm_ a Baratheon, aren't I? And Tom and Joff and mother too, now?"

 

He looks down at her in silence, then shakes his head.

 

"You are a Baratheon, child. Don't let your mother tell you otherwise."

 

Under the desk, Myrcella kicks her legs harder.

 

"She doesn't like it when I speak back to her," she says petulantly, scratching at the desktop with a fingernail. Then, struck with sudden inspiration, she looks back up at Uncle Stannis, who is still watching her with that peculiar expression on his face, "Uncle Stannis, doesn't fury mean _cross_?"

 

"Something like that," Uncle Stannis says, "Why?"

 

"Well… well, mother says she is a Lannister, but she's _always_ cross, so I think she's a Baratheon, no matter what she says, because she is always… fury. _Fury?_ "

 

She looks up at him and his mouth tips up very, very slightly from the flat line in which it is usually set, and she feels a chime of triumph.

 

"Furious. Always furious," he corrects.

 

"Furious," Myrcella repeats to herself, then nods, "Yes. That. Maybe don't tell her I said that. Or father. They won't be best pleased."

 

Unexpectedly, he reaches out touch the top of her head briefly, then goes back to his book.

 

"You're a clever girl, Myrcella."

 

She beams at him.

 

"Thank you."

 

* * *

 

She is eight when court moves to Winterfell because, Ser Arys explains, her father needs to ask Lord Eddard Stark to help him be King, because sometimes it becomes very difficult for one man to rule seven kingdoms, and Lord Jon Arryn who used to do the job has died, does Myrcella understand?

 

Myrcella likes Ser Arys, is fond of him and the way he lets her and Tom play Lord of the Crossing without telling her that she's not behaving like a proper little lady, and she knows that he is supposed to protect her, but sometimes he speaks to her like she is still a girl of five years, and she scrunches her nose up at his longwinded explanations. Instead, she sits next to Uncle Tyrion when they are breaking their fast one morning and he is still slightly dazed with having too much wine the night before, and manages to wheedle enough information from him to confirm her suspicions.

 

"How old are you, again, Myrcella?" Tyrion asks once she has managed to ascertain that Lord Eddard Stark is, in fact, the _Ned_ of whom her father often speaks when he is loud and in his cups, and father is going to ask him to be his _Hand_ , because Lord Jon, who was the Lord of the Eyrie, has died.

 

He is watching her with his two mismatched eyes, the one green like mother's and the other as black as the Baratheon stag, and she finishes chewing the bite of toast in her mouth and swallows before she speaks, just like her mother has told her is the proper thing to do.

 

"Eight," she says proudly, and Tyrion smiles.

 

"Ah. Eight. I remember being eight, those were _glorious_ days, sweetling, _glorious_." He waves his hands as he speaks, like he always does, and a bit of ale slops over the side of his cup and down his wrist. He shakes it off, and Myrcella giggles at the face he makes.

 

"And are you enjoying being eight?" he asks, "Renly says that you're being taught to ride."

 

"I am," Myrcella nods, "Like a _man_ , with my legs on either side of the saddle and in breeches, and mother-"

 

She drops her voice, "Mother hates it, but father thinks it's a brilliant idea, and it's better than being inside mending his shirts all day."

 

Tyrion laughs.

 

"Really? I've heard you're quite good with your needle, and learning to ride is a bit painful, at the beginning, surely."

 

"Yes, _but_. Sewing is fun when you don't have to do it the whole day, and I don't know why father's shirts need mending all the time, anyway. I do like it, but maybe not all the time, I think. And did mother tell you, my horse was born a little funny, so he only has one ear, so I call him _Ear_ , and none of the other horses look like him, so it's nice and he's special and easy to spot in the stables when I go to find him. But, but it’s okay because Uncle Renly says he’s a sweet horse, which I suppose means he lets me ride him and he doesn’t go _too_ quickly, so his missing ear doesn’t really matter, I think. He has a long tail, too, and he doesn’t whinny too loud, so that’s good, too."

 

Tyrion is laughing when she finishes, and she smiles, puts the last piece of her toast into her mouth, and wipes at the jam on the corner of her lips with a cloth.

 

"Oh, sweetling, how you make me miss childhood," he says, "Never change, my dear."

 

At that, Myrcella makes a face, hurriedly swallows around her mouthful, "Mother says she can't _wait_ for me and Tom to grow up so we can be like Joff, because she doesn't like us playing and being _children_ all the time. Father always gets cross when he hears her say that, though, because he says children are supposed to be children, and then- oh. I don't think I'm supposed to tell you this."

 

In spite of it, Tyrion seems to laugh all that much harder, and pets her forearm.

 

"Don't listen to your mother, Myrcella. Be a child until you can no longer get away with being one-" he takes a swig of his ale, hiccoughs, "Being a grown up isn't as much fun as everyone thinks it is."

 

His words are ringing in her ears when they arrive at Winterfell nine days later, and she thinks it must be true, for she watches the way that Lord Eddard holds himself, stiffly and unsmiling, and never seems to be having quite so much fun as her laughing father. Still, though, she decides that she likes him, and the way that he is always so serious and careful, or the way that he always seems to be near to Lady Catelyn, who is beautiful like mother but in a different way, and who speaks in an accent that is half the North and half the South. More than that, she decides that she likes their children, the ones who look like Lord Eddard and the ones who look like Lady Catelyn alike, because they are all clever and kind and good to talk to (and very beautiful, she thinks, of Sansa and Robb and tiny little Rickon with their red hair and blue eyes, and Arya and the not-brother Jon, so dark and sharp and wonderful).

 

In the wheelhouse back to King's Landing, she rides with mother and Sansa and Arya and Tom, and she thinks that maybe Sansa is already turning into an adult because she smiles less and stammers when mother asks her questions. She hopes that she is wrong, though, because King's Landing is full of adult treating her like it is her fault that she is too young to understand them, and she had hoped for someone to play with.

 

* * *

 

Lots of things happen in the month after she turns nine, but what she remembers clearest in her head is not father's funeral, nor Joff's coronation- as she grows older she cannot summon more than a few hazy images of both these scenes, no matter how hard she tries- but the days after Lord Eddard's beheading. She remembers the horror on Sansa's face, so much like her Lady mother's (Myrcella does not want to think about Lady Catelyn with her wide smile and curious accent, of the way she will react when she hears her husband is dead and a _traitor_ ), the glint of Ser Ilyn's sword, and the trickle of blood between the smooth tiles of the Sept's floor. Afterwards, mother gathers her and Joff and Tom in her solar for luncheon, and Myrcella eats some of her salad but cannot look at the suckling pig in the middle of the table without seeing Lord Eddard's head, mouth falling open and eyes shut, so she excuses herself under the pretense of a stomachache. Mother doesn't stop her, only presses her hand to Myrcella's forehead and promises to send Grandmaester Pycelle, so she slips out of the room to make for her own chambers.

 

It's odd, she notices vaguely, that Ser Arys is not waiting outside the room for her, but through one of the corridor's windows she can see people bustling about the courtyard and the entire castle seems strangely noisy. She is not yet old enough to understand the exact meaning of _treason_ , at least beyond the fact that it means someone did something they gave their word not to, but she does notice that the people running around the castle look like her dolls do, flopping and falling about, when Joff comes into her room and shakes her dollhouse to see if she will cry. Only she never does, so he grows tired of it and leaves, but as she freezes by the window, washerwomen and mailed knights and even _Varys_ keep bustling about in the curious, awkward half running-half walking way that she does when she and Tommen are chasing each other in the Sept but don’t want to be seen by mother.

 

"Myrcella!"

 

She looks to her left, hand still on the windowsill, and it's the Knight of Flowers and Uncle Renly, both of them in traveling cloaks and Uncle Renly with his hair tied back.

 

"Uncle Renly!" she says breathlessly, rushing over to meet them, "What's _happening_? Is there a fire? Are their _invaders_? Everybody is running out in the courtyard, and I saw Varys with-"

 

"Sweetling," Uncle Renly says, with little of the softness he usually reserves for her and Tom and in its place an urgency that frightens her, "You shouldn't be out and about in the castle right now."

 

"But I…" Myrcella looks up at him, "I couldn't eat, not after what happened in the Sept with Lord Eddard, so I asked mother could I please be excused, and she said yes, and I was going to my room but I don't understand, why are you and Ser Loras in riding clothes, where are you going?"

 

"My darling," he says, dropping to his knees so he can hold her by the shoulders, and it strikes her that nobody has called her that since father died, so she looks him in the eye, "Ser Loras and I have to go away for a while. Joffrey…"

 

Because Myrcella has been raised not to interrupt, she doesn't mention that fact that _Joff_ is now the King, and Uncle Renly, the man who presented her with Ear and taught her how to say limericks and rhymes that made father laugh and mother scowl, squeezes her shoulders.

 

"Things will be different in court, for a while, because everybody is trying to get used to having a new King, and it might be a little…difficult, so Ser Loras and I have to go away, and make sure everything is safe, but you need to stay here, and be good for your mother, and look after Tom, alright?"

 

The thing about Uncle Renly, Myrcella thinks, is that he is so happy all the time that he doesn't wear his sadness or worry well, and the way that he keeps looking over his shoulder sets her teeth on edge. Fleetingly, she thinks of Uncle Stannis, who she hasn't seen in over two weeks, and she frowns, because she doesn't understand.

 

"If it's going to be different, and difficult, and you need to go make things safe, why are you leaving me _here_? Why aren't you staying with us?"

 

Above her, Ser Loras makes a strange noise in the back of his throat that makes Uncle Renly look up at him, before he pulls Myrcella sharply into a hug.

 

"Oh, Myrcella," he says, patting her back, "One day, my darling, you will understand. I pray that the gods will keep you safe until we meet again, and you need to be a good girl, alright? Go straight to your room after this, and don't come out until your mother fetches you."

 

He holds her out at arm's length, "And you keep an eye on Joff for your favourite uncle."

 

Myrcella wants to protest, to say that he and Uncle Stannis and Uncle Tyrion are _all_ her favourite uncles, but he just kisses her swiftly on the forehead and stands. Ser Loras tries to smile at her but it looks forced, like a puppet, and she swallows.

 

"Goodbye, Uncle."

 

He nods at her, jaw clenched, in the face that he wears during tourneys, and Ser Loras lays a hand momentarily on his arm, and suddenly she has to turn to watch them continue down the hallway, cloaks billowing behind them. She doesn't see Uncle Renly again, only hears her mother and Joff speaking about his _treason_ one night at supper, and now she's old enough to know what it means as well as to substitute it in her head with _things that make mother and Joff and grandfather cross_ , because she figures it may as well mean that, anyway. Still, the thought is little comfort when Uncle Jaime tells mother that Uncle Renly is dead by the hand of some mysterious shadow, and mother smiles. Myrcella decides, then, that no matter what her mother says about them being Lannisters, she herself is a Baratheon, because all she feels at the way grandfather and mother and Joff and Uncle Jaime try to hide their smiles like Uncle Renly's death is glorious news, is _furious_.

 

* * *

 

She has her tenth birthday on a boat in the middle of the sea of Dorne, and Ser Arys presents her with a sealed envelope from her mother that he has been keeping safe amidst his belongings. She holds the seal over a candle to warm it before sliding the blade of a table knife beneath it, peeling the wax off in a single crimson coin. The envelope itself is heavy, and inside there is no letter, only a golden chain and a locket. The back of the locket is smooth, and Myrcella flips it over in her fingers to find a roaring lion on a red background. She has heard the whispers about mother and Uncle Jaime, and doesn't want to think too much about what they mean, because the thought alone makes her stomach flip and her mind wander to places she knows it shouldn't.

 

The sigil pressed into the wax is a crowned lion, now, for Joff, reared on its hind legs and in battle with a stag, and Myrcella runs the pad of her thumb over it and wonders what is to become of her, she of the two houses built from rage and fury. _One house_ , she thinks bitterly _._ Once, Cersei would have had her believe that she was a Lannister and Lannister alone. Now, the entire realm seems ready to believe that that is exactly what she is, and Myrcella is more determined than ever to prove that she is a Baratheon, if anything.

 

When the ship docks, Prince Doran and his wife Mellario are waiting amidst members of their court, all dressed in the dry sand tones and deep reds of Dorne, and Myrcella is suddenly conscious of the way her hair, golden and bright in the sunlight, is so different from the sea of black and dark brown heads around her.

 

Her betrothed is three-and-ten, with straight dark hair and a seeming inability to keep still, and Myrcella is relieved that they are, at the very least, almost of an age with one another. She isn't so sure she can bear another adult ordering her about all the time, and the deferential set of her head is beginning to make her neck ache. As she disembarks from the ship, the dry air blowing some of her hair in her face, she makes her choice. Prince Doran and the Martells are expecting a Lannister, a miniature facsimile of the Queen Mother- but her mother and brother cannot reach her here, and she is determined to set herself apart from them by means other than distance. At the dock, Trystane Martell waves at her, raising his other hand to shield his eyes against the sun, and Myrcella smiles in response. In her skirts, the red locket bounces against her leg and she adjusts her gait, determinedly ignoring the weight in her pocket.

 

She raises her head, takes a deep breath, and vows never to be the kind of person to inspire in anyone else what she feels towards her own family.

 

* * *

 

When she is eleven, Arianne tries to take her back to Westeros, telling her that things are safer now, and she'll be able to see Tom again, and that the rumours of mother and Uncle Jaime have been proven false, and all is well in the capital (later, Myrcella recalls that the words seemed a lie to her even then, but it was her own desperation that allowed her to believe them). When she is eleven, she loses an ear, because for not the first time in history a daughter has lied to her Lord father. She almost laughs at the irony of her first horse having the same affliction, and wonders, bitterly, if wherever Uncle Renly is now he is watching her and laughing at the same thing. When she is eleven, she receives news that Margaery Tyrell is Joffrey's (not, _Joff_ , not anymore) Queen and expecting his heir, that Tommen has been sent to the Wall, and that Robb Stark, now the King in the North, has seized the Twins and marches for King's Landing to free his sisters. She prays that Sansa is still there when he arrives.

 

Tommen's journey to the wall, she learns, was intended to broker some sort of peace between the North and South, with Cersei attempting to trade the life and services of her son for the calming of Northern forces. Even Myrcella, only beginning to understand the reason behind many a courtly decision, sees the folly in this: Tommen is but ten years old, never having wielded live steel when last Myrcella saw him, and the North will not trade the life of a child for the injustices they had seen against the Starks.

 

She explains as much to Trystane, when they are playing cyvasse one morning, her betrothed leaning forward in his seat with his elbows on his knees, brow furrowed as he tries to find his next move. Myrcella scratches absently at the scar on her cheek, which is only now starting to fade into a creamy smear, pale and smooth against her freckled skin (mother had always been so fussy about Myrcella's complexion, forcing her out of the sun and into a hat, and Myrcella feels the thrill of rebellion when she thinks about what mother would say if she saw her _now_ ).

 

"I think the Queen Regent knows that," Trystane says, when she has once more declared the entire thing _futile_ , enraged on her brother's part for his exile, "But surely, Tommen posed no threat to Joffrey? He is a third child."

 

"And a second son," Myrcella says impatiently, blocking his next move with a flick of her hand, "Westeros does not follow Dornish rules of succession, like you well know, but if Robb Stark unseats Joffrey, they can put Tom in his place."

 

"Isn't that what the Queen Regent-" Trystane always calls mother _Queen Regent_ and never _your mother_ , "-wants, though? A Lannister on the throne?"

 

"I think…no," Myrcella says, after a pause, "Joffrey, specifically. She has always had a special fondness for him, above Tom and I."

 

"So special that she would send Tommen to stand against the Others?" Trystane moves his rabble and Myrcella, almost laughing at the familiar play, counters with her dragon.

 

"Likely only because all other avenues have failed, but yes. I met Robb Stark, once, and his father, and I don't think he is the type to be cowed by the money mother would have tried to placate him with. I have no doubt she would have offered him gold to turn his cloak."

 

"She is a _Lannister_ , after all," Trystane says with impressive nastiness, leaning back in his chair.

 

" _Oh?_ " Myrcella asks, raising an eyebrow, and Trystane shrugs.

 

"Father says _you're_ a Baratheon, no matter who your mother and father are, and I think he's right. You're not like her."

 

"This isn't like her, either," Myrcella sighs, mirroring Trystane's posture in her own chair, "Once she might have marched armies out to meet Robb Stark on the battlefield, and made no attempt to strike a deal with him and his men."

 

"The Young Wolf is _barely_ a man- seven and ten! It would not do to lose to such a young man, though if it is like you said and she tried to win him with coin, he would make an impressive soldier for her side, " Trystane says, and Myrcella nods.

 

"She is scared, I think. To be doing what she did. But scared of what, though? This war is _their_ fault. What is coming to them... is coming to them."

 

"Well," Trystane grins at her, gesturing at the cyvasse board between them, "Of losing, of course."

 

* * *

 

She doesn't flower until she is fourteen, and Trystane seven-and-ten. He is her best friend, and while Myrcella does not feel for him the things maidens in songs do for their knights in burnished armour, she does not dread marriage so much as she once did.

 

He is shot in the head with a crossbow while returning from an early morning stroll, and Myrcella stands stony faced at the funeral, as there are whispers around her that the arrow was loosed by a Lannister man, and Prince Doran takes her under his arm and offers her his banner.

 

That night, news arrives from Westeros that Stark has allied himself with the exiled Targaryen children, currently making their way back to the mainland, and the Lannisters’ hold on the throne is staked upon the continued loyalty of High Garden, the Stormlands, and the Westerlands.

 

“The North is not the only one that remembers, Myrcella,” Prince Doran says, as the royal family sits in his solar and Myrcella leafs blindly through a tome from one of his shelves, “Dorne has not forgotten what Rhaegar Targaryen did to my sister.”

 

He rises, and Myrcella looks to Mellario, unsure of how to respond.

 

“There was a time when I would not, even in my cups, ever think to consider an alliance with those _dragons_ ,” he hisses the last word as though it is venom on his tongue, and Myrcella doesn’t think she’s ever seen him quite so enraged. He is terrifying this way, not unlike the way her father was when he would rail and yell at her mother after too much wine.

 

“But after this? The loss of my sister was a wound beginning to heal, but my _son_ , my heir- I will not stand by and allow the Lannisters to continue their reign of treachery. They have killed my son and they will feel the _wrath_ of the viper, by the will of the gods, I swear it. I will kill every last golden haired lion with my own two hands, if it comes to it, and then, when the realm is rid of them at last, I will rest.”

 

“My lord…” Myrcella says, startled, and Prince Doran looks at her as though seeing her for the first time. Her heart thuds in her chest and she thinks, for the first time since she arrived in Dorne, how _easy_ it would be for someone to remember her parentage and run her through, to trade the life of an heir for the life of a bastard.

 

The Prince and his wife seem to read her thoughts, for they both wear matching expressions of horror, and it is Mellario who speaks first.

 

“Myrcella, no,” she says, “You cannot think-?”

 

Slowly, Myrcella shakes her head, the world beginning to buzz in her ears.

 

“No, _no_ , you were but a child when you arrived here, and you are our ward now. Not hostage to your mother’s good behaviour, but hostage _from_. You have proved time and again that you are not your mother, or your brother, and you have our word of protection,” Mellario says hastily, glancing from Prince Doran to Myrcella, the firelight casting deep etchings of grief on her face. Myrcella flinches as she realises how old the Prince and his wife truly are, and looks away.

 

“We will not throw you to the den of lions,” Prince Doran says gravely, “For not even a stag would have a fighting chance there.”

 

Myrcella tries to breathe.

 

“A viper, perhaps,” he says, “But you will never quite be one of us, I fear. Trystane’s death prevented that.”

 

* * *

 

Myrcella Lannister is six-and-ten when she becomes Myrcella Baratheon, and the Martells of Sunspear send her as an envoy to the North, declaring the loyalty and swords of Dorne to King Robb Stark and his men, swearing to unseat the Lannisters from the Iron Throne once and for all. Aegon Targaryen journeys toward Westeros with his cousin to reclaim the Iron Throne, and the King has not been seen outside the Red Keep in weeks. Myrcella rides for the Twins with three of Arianne's own guards, in the black and gold of her own house and with an orange ribbon for Sunspear binding back her hair.

 

The riverlands are damp and green in the way that only lushness weighed down by winter can be, the sky almost blindingly white under heavy clouds. Myrcella listens to the Stark banners snapping in the wind, looks up at the castle as the gates are opened before them, and wonders if her mother knows what is coming for her. The force of the North has never seemed so real as the stories paint it to be, and now, standing in its midst, thrumming with barely contained energy, Myrcella feels humbled in its face.

 

The King himself is out when the envoy arrives- returning from a week treating with the Rootes of Lord Harroway’s Town, arranging for the opening of the Kingsroad for his armies. He arrives on the third day of her stay, riding in with whom Myrcella assumes to be Theon Greyjoy, the Kraken turned wolf, the pair of them in black and grey on dark horses, and an alarmingly large creature that she can only assume to be the King's much spoken of dire wolf snarling at their heels.

 

Myrcella watches them ride up, watches the King raise a hand in greeting to his men, the smile slide off his face as he sobers and dismounts before her. She dips into a curtsy. He is a mix of his mother (beautiful, vivid Lady Catelyn, murdered at her brother's own wedding, at the hands of a Frey) and his father (rangy and controlled, Stark in name and nature), and she tries in her head to reconcile this image with the young boy she remembers from years ago. The beard, she notes wryly, is perhaps what makes it difficult.

 

"Your grace."

 

"Rise, Lady Baratheon," he says, "I trust your journey was without event?"

 

"Aye, your grace. And I trust the same for yours?"

 

The King exchanges a glance with Theon, then looks back to Myrcella.

 

"In a manner of speaking, my lady. Have the arrangements been to your liking, thus far?" he lowers his voice slightly, "And my men behaved honourably?"

 

"Yes, your grace," Myrcella replies, taken slightly aback, "I have been met with nothing but hospitality."

 

It is an exaggeration, perhaps, and Robb Stark seems to recognise it as such, but says nothing. Instead, he nods, and looks to the sky.

 

"I shall beg your pardon and my leave, my lady, to stable my horse and refresh myself. We will sup together, if it suits you?"

 

"Of course, your grace," Myrcella says, curtsying again, and Robb nods once more before leading his horse away by the reigns. Theon Greyjoy looks over Myrcella once more, before he, too, departs.

 

Supper that night makes Myrcella think of those first few nights at Dorne, when she could not seem to get comfortable in her seat and the food laid out on the table was exotic and unfamiliar. She wonders briefly when Westeros became foreign to her, and crosses her legs at the ankle under the table.

 

"I do hope my men have not been too cold towards you," Robb says, prodding at the side of beef with a roasting fork, before turning it over to slice it, "They are wary of envoys at the best of times, and I can only hope you were well received after your travels."

 

"And wary they have been," Myrcella says drily, "For I was well met, though few have spoken to me since, and whether it is because I have the Lannister look or because I am a woman, I cannot say."

 

Robb raises an eyebrow at her.

 

"No matter," she says, watching him slice the beef with a methodical precision incongruous with a man surely used to having servants perform such tasks for him, "Perhaps it is wise for them not to be too open to every envoy to pass their gates."

 

"Are you suggesting that I have reason not to trust you?" he asks, straightening in his seat.

 

"No, your grace," Myrcella says, "Merely commending the vigilance of your men."

 

She watches Robb's brow furrow for a moment, barely noticeable, before he takes a slice of meat between the roasting prong and knife, holds it towards her.

 

"Your plate, my lady," he says, and when Myrcella hesitates before offering it up, the corner of his mouth tips upwards, "You are my guest, after all."

 

"Thank you, your grace," Myrcella says, accepting the food and setting her plate back down.

 

"You needn't append that to all you say," Robb says, slicing some meat for himself, "I am quite aware of my own title and it does make every sentence that much longer. Now, if I may be direct: what news of Dorne?"

 

"Dorne has declared for you," Myrcella says, sliding from the pocket of her sleeve the letter from Prince Doran, "The six thousand swords and shields of Dorne and the Martells of Sunspear are yours to command."

 

Robb takes the letter when she holds it out to him, breaks the seal with his index finger and reads it, before a grim sort of smile spreads on his face.

 

"I was beginning to worry that mayhaps I would be doing much convincing during your stay," he says, "Prince Doran has been remarkably reticent in declaring either way during this war. I was unsure whether your visit would bring news of Dorne's continued neutrality in this."

 

"The Martells carry the weight of an entire dominion with their decision," Myrcella says carefully, "Prince Doran wanted to be certain that he would align himself with the side that would most benefit his people."

 

"And are the Dornish not _your_ people?" Robb asks curiously, and Myrcella raises her chin.

 

"I have spent my childhood and youth being displaced," she says, "And it appears that this has only now become somewhat beneficial."

 

"In the sense of what?"

 

"I have ties of birth, of fostering, and, one might say regrettably, of blood. All these have some use in politics, it would appear."

 

"And you would turn against those ties of blood?"

 

"I would turn against the family who killed my father and brought the realm to ruins," Myrcella says fiercely, "The Lannisters never treated me as one of them, so I see no need to cleave to them when they are the root of such injustices."

 

“The King is your brother.”

 

“In blood, perhaps. But there are many reasons, your grace, why anyone would want him off the Throne, as I’m sure you know.”

 

Robb studies her for a long moment, bringing his chin forward to rest on his hands, plate abandoned on the table.

 

"Should we win King's Landing, the Lannisters will be tried and likely condemned," he says, eventually, "Even if you do not consider them your kin, would you be willing to watch this happen?"

 

"I do not wish them ill," Myrcella says, "And I do not want to see them die, but I know that… I will not stand on the wrong side of this war if only for the blood that flows through my veins."

 

"There are men who will find that hard to accept," Robb says heavily, "They think such a betrayal makes you hard to trust. I suspect that is why they have been so cold with you."

 

"It is only a betrayal if I had their trust to begin," Myrcella says, "I was a child when they sent me away, and even then it was as a pawn in their game, and nothing more. I do not need your men to trust me; I make no moves to make them my men. I am here as an envoy of the Martells, to bring news of an alliance between the North and Dorne. I mean for you and your crown to trust me, and the word of Dorne, but I ask for nothing else."

 

Robb runs a hand over his face, shakes his head.

 

"This war has made a mess of us all. Is there more to discuss?"

 

Myrcella takes a sip of water.

 

"The Prince is making arrangements for direct communication with the Dornish men in King's Landing. He worries that his distance from the capital puts his people at risk."

 

"He is to buy out half of King's Landing, then," Robb remarks with surprise, "For near all that remain in the capital are the Dornish, if not the Storm and Wester Lords who are yet to swear fealty to us."

 

Myrcella opens her mouth to respond but shuts it again as Theon Greyjoy, stealing into the room with unnerving silence, scoffs and presses over her words, "And who will pay for these men? Lannister gold, is it? Stealing from your parents only to depose them? Good daughter you are, eh?"

 

He takes a seat at the end of the table and Robb frowns at him.

  
“Theon, you are both _late_ and being rude. Pick one or the other, lest I send you out.”

 

“ _My apologies_ , Lady Baratheon,” Theon says, managing to lace Myrcella’s name with an astounding amount of vitriol, and Robb shoots her an apologetic look over his raised cup.

 

"Dorne has no need for Lannister gold," Myrcella responds calmly, regarding Theon down the length of her nose, "The coffers of the region are more well stocked than the Prince would have any believe."

 

"Be that as it may, my lady, that does not answer to the issue of sheer numbers that must be persuaded," Robb says fairly, and Myrcella grimaces.

 

"Fewer men than you should think. The Tyrells, as it happens, are not only growing strong, but also growing _doubtful_ of their ineffectual King. They are playing both fields, to be fair, though have thus far made promising spies, if not exactly allies."

 

"The Tyrells?" Robb asks, floored, "That is… unexpected."

 

"Joffrey is married to Margaery, after all," Myrcella says, and her voice softens for a moment before she shakes her head, speaking to Robb but fixing Theon with a sharp glare as he continues to watch her with bare hostility, "It would seem that they, at the very least, are beginning to understand the idea that ties of arranged marriages do not preclude conflicts, or cruelty. Quite the opposite, in fact."

 

"You are saying that the troubles of Westeros are hinged on someone getting married to someone they didn't like?" Theon laughs hollowly, "I don't know what is more ridiculous, that or the fact that you seem to think the Tyrells will turn cloak for the sake of a _girl_."

 

“ _Theon_ ,” Robb says sharply, “You will keep a civil tongue or I will _send you out_ , there are things to which even my advisors need not be privy. Do you see the Greatjon here?”

 

He raises an eyebrow, “No, so _bite_ your tongue. I apologise, Lady Baratheon.”

 

"Your grace has nothing for which to apologise. The Tyrells will turn cloak because the capital has their daughter, and once this is no longer enough, they will be drained of _all_ they have: _sons_ , gold, lands, titles. Marriage to the crown is as good as signing one's rights away, under this King."

 

Theon scowls, "I refuse to believe Mace Tyrell would risk his beloved roses for his youngest child, Lady _Baratheon_ , forgive my doubt, if you will."

 

"Of course, Ser Greyjoy," Myrcella says flatly, "I know that it is only borne of the fact that your own father failed to do the same for you."

 

Robb raises his eyebrows at her then turns to look at Theon, who is, for the first time since coming into Myrcella's presence, not wearing an expression of open contempt, but rather looks grimly impressed.

 

"You are quick with words," he says, "And like a better politician than I thought. Very well, Robb, we can keep her."

 

"I'm not a pet!" Myrcella says sharply, and Robb, chin in hand, smiles at her. She feels her stomach clench in a manner not entirely unpleasant, and drops her gaze.

 

* * *

 

She is newly seven-and-ten when she has to spend a month at The Twins waiting for the snows to clear, and Robb Stark, softened by the thick snow that forces a standstill to his military progress, teaches her how to shoot an arrow.

 

Myrcella is wearing borrowed furs that smell like the back of the cupboard in her childhood room that she was convinced was inhabited by a grumkin, her heavy riding cloak, and a pair of woollen breeches beneath her gown, and Robb feigns surprise when she tells him that she cannot shoot.

 

"A lady who rides and can wield a lance and sword but cannot free an arrow?" he asks, toying with the feathers protruding from his quiver, "Surely not?"

 

"The master-at-arms at Dorne thought it better that I learnt to wield sword and lance first, for he said that should it ever come to it, the same basic principles could be used with any long object, should I need to defend myself. I cannot say I am anything more than merely competent with both weapons, your grace. Though-"

 

She smiles wryly, "It is rather difficult to fashion a bow and arrow when in a pinch, I would imagine."

 

Robb laughs, "I've not had personal experience with that, my lady, but I assume you to be correct."

 

Myrcella looks at the bow in his hands, and though it is lightweight and the arrows thin and wooden for practice, she thinks immediately of a crossbow and a thick metal shaft, and the cloying heat of funeral pyres in the middle of Dornish summer.

 

"And since Trystane… the Prince has not seen fit to keep crossbows in the palace." She looks up at Robb and he holds her gaze, brow furrowed.

 

"I was very sorry to hear of his death, Myrcella," he says carefully, "And even sorrier to hear that those responsible have gone without justice."

 

He does look truly sorry, lowering his bow and his eyes very, very blue against the white and grey bleakness around him, and Myrcella shakes her head.

 

"I am sorry, too. For it is widely known at whose word that arrow was loosed, but in these times- or, in fact, any- justice never starts from the bottom up. Not when injustice is a thing that can be paid for in gold."

 

"You don't think-" Robb's frown deepens, "Not _Joffrey_?"

 

Myrcella toys with the clasp of her cloak as she strings together her response, and tries to ignore the way her stomach writhes under the intensity of Robb's gaze.

 

"That first night, when we supped together, and I told you that there were many reasons I had, for turning cloak against my blood. I-" she takes a breath, determinedly meets his eye, "They killed Robert, who I knew to be my father, they disgraced his brothers, banished me to Dorne, exiled my brother. Before this, there were things I saw as a child in the capital that I did not understand, but now I…”

 

_Make sense of the things that I remember at night, when it is dark and quiet and my mother’s voice haunts me_ , she thinks, and Robb takes a careful step towards her, raises and lowers his hand in an awkward, aborted attempt to touch her arm in a gesture of comfort.

 

“Myrcella,” he says, quietly, “I don’t…”

 

“What they did to _Sansa_ , or no doubt what has befallen Margaery Tyrell- Robb, what they will do to _anyone_ who they can use. The slights against myself are ones that I can- must learn to live with, but for what they have done to those I held dear, and to the _realm_ , I cannot- I will not turn my head. I have little doubt that Joffrey ordered the arrow that killed Trystane, when he heard we were finally to be wed. It was an act as cruel and as meritless as any other they have exacted on so many others before."

 

Robb bites his lip.

 

"Did you…were you happy, there, with Trystane?"

 

"I loved him as a brother," Myrcella says, "And as my closest friend, though our marriage would still have been one of duty. Yes, I was happy there, for a time, and Joffrey has always sought to crush the happiness of others."

 

There is an uncomfortable pause, and Robb plucks absently at his unstrung bow.

 

“I would promise that we will bring justice for all the wrongs they have done, if I knew for certain it was a promise I could keep,” he says finally, and Myrcella- slowly, so that he sees what she is doing and has plenty of time to stop it- reaches for his hand.

 

“The fact that you will not make a promise without certainty of keeping it sets you apart from most other men, Robb Stark.”

 

He slides his fingers between hers and she smiles, in spite of herself, “And I have faith in you.”

 

* * *

 

Days pass and the snows melt, and the Northern armies ripple at the news that Stannis Baratheon has hinted at swearing fealty to the army of the North and as such has called Dragonstone’s banners, but despairs of the Storm Lords refusal to cleave to him as their liege lord. A messenger arrives with a letter from her uncle, and Myrcella, startled by the revelation that Renly Baratheon named her his heir before his death, is determined to return as the Lady of Storm’s End and call her banners to depose Joffrey. The Storm Lords, her uncle writes, are seeking to unseat Joffrey by military needs if necessary, but will not do so at his word. Myrcella, thinking that it must sting her uncle that none cleaved to him as King nor as Lord, packs her bags and mounts her horse, her Dornish guards all too eager to leave the bone deep bite that is the winter of the North. She herself thinks that she might miss it, the black and white clarity the brutal cold affords, and the day she leaves her heart in her chest is heavier than the saddle bags she rides with.

 

"I hope that I am not being improper, my lady," Robb says, tugging sharply on the reins of her horse to keep it in check, "But I… I must tell you, that were the circumstances of our meeting and time together any different, I would have sought to court you."

 

He looks up at her, face open and hopeful in the bright white morning clouds, and she, feeling her heart skipping in her chest, reaches up to tug the orange ribbon from her hair, presses it quickly into Robb's hand so the other men cannot see. It is a shadow of a favour, truly, with neither her sigil nor her initials, but he closes his fingers tightly around it and she squeezes his hand, just once, before grasping at her reins.

 

"And I would have liked that very much, your grace," she says truthfully, though she cannot summon a smile to accompany the words. Instead, she pulls the reigns gently from his grip and squeezes the side of her horse as he rears. As the front hooves land in the half melted snow and damp soil, she catches Theon's eye and nods at his salute.

 

"Ride well, Lady Baratheon!" Robb calls, hand still closed around her favour in his fist, "Until we meet again!"

 

"Till then, your grace," she responds over her shoulder, "Ride _hard_."

 

* * *

 

 The Storm Lords, perhaps understandably, are wary of her when she rides in, hair streaming behind her and scarred face unveiled. She doesn't look like the golden little Princess she last was when she visited Storm's End, doesn't even look like the foster daughter of Prince Doran Martell. In the borrowed dark cloak of the North, horse and skirts splattered with mud, reigns firmly in hand, she slides from the back of her horse and walks into the great hall, prays to the gods old and new alike that they will see reason.

 

Stannis has retreated to Dragonstone in shame, she learns, standing before the sworn houses of Storm’s End- and part of her is both glad and sorry that he is not here to watch her, for the last time, prove herself worthy of the Baratheon name. When she addresses the men, they are passionate about two things: that Joffrey must be unseated, and that they will not follow Stannis into battle. They were Renly's men, and his alone, they claim, and Myrcella, thinking of the long withstanding rivalry between her uncles, digs bloody crescents into her palms for fisting her fingers too tightly, because they acknowledge her as Renly's heir but they do not trust her.

 

"You would take arms against your kin?" Lord Sebastian Errol asks, voice rasping through the hall, "Would you have us call you kinslayer to your father’s _kingslayer_?"

 

Myrcella raises an eyebrow at the bawdy laughter that erupts, and refuses to blink as she meets Lord Sebastian's eye and he is the one to look away, and silence blankets the hall as it becomes clear that she will not rise to their taunts. On the left of the hall, the Lord of Corpses nods at her, and she finds herself steeled by the action, clenching her fists tighter and straightening her spine.

 

"Aye, my Lord,” she says, "I do not skirt from the fact the Lannisters and Joffrey are my kin-”

 

There is a muttered, “With a face like _that_ , what else could she be?”, and Myrcella looks around until her eyes land on Greybeard Lord Hugh Grandison, chuckling into his beard and nudging the knight beside him.

 

_Lord Rouse-Me-Not_ , Myrcella thinks scornfully, _how fitting_. She looks back to Lord Sebastian.

 

“-but you and I both have seen much blood shed in these years past, and we alike have seen how little it is worth. So, yes, my lords. I would take arms against the woman who killed my father, who murdered both his Hands, who banished my younger brother to the Wall. I would partake in a war that overthrows those who ordered the death of my betrothed, the beating of the young women at court, and the disgracing of the Starks and Warden of the North. You were boys, men, under the rule of the Mad King, yet you do nothing to stop Joffrey from playing his own games from King's Landing. You ask if I would have myself named kinslayer? I would move to unseat a mad man, yes.”

 

The moniker “Mad King” appears to have stirred the men: Selwyn Tarth of Evenfall Hall and Roland Storm watch with naked interest and the hall has fallen eerily silent. 

 

“I would implore you to ally yourselves with the King in the North and the four Kingdoms he now presides over, and to swear feaIty to him and Aegon Targaryen when he arrives,” she says in as steady a voice as she can manage, “I would, as Renly Baratheon's heir and the rightful lady of the Stormlands, ask you to take arms against the family who have made Westeros bleed. If the end of needless bloodshed and treachery will be bought by the naming of one girl a kinslayer, then so be it."

 

Lord Wylde joins his fingertips beneath his chin, watches her inscrutably.

 

"You have the Lannister look. How do we know that, should the Young Wolf fail and the Targaryens fail to swoop in, you would not cross back to your grandfather and beg for his mercy?"

 

"A fair point," Myrcella concedes, "But I was raised in King's Landing by Renly and Robert Baratheon's men and women, and when the time came for me to be of any interest to my mother, I was sent to foster at Sunspear, where I have lived from the age of ten to six-and-ten. I am a Westerosian first, my lords, a Baratheon second, a Lady of Storm's End and a child of Sunspear thereafter. I may have Lannister blood that flows through me, but that is not through any fault of my own, nor any lack of trying."

 

She takes a deep breath, looks at the men before her, and rises, "Now, I ask you again, will the Targaryen King, armies of the North and of Sunspear have your swords, when the time comes?"

 

Thirty-one pairs of eyes watch her with unfathomable expressions, and Myrcella wills herself not to falter.

 

"You have mine, Myrcella Baratheon," Lord Dondarrion says, after a moment, and drops his knee, hand on the hilt of his sword, "And my word to fight for the true king."

 

Lord Errol follows, his sword clanging to the stone floor.

 

"And mine."

 

Lord Roland Storm.

 

"And mine."

 

Lord Tarth.

 

“And mine.”

 

Lord Eldon Estermont.

 

The words begin to echo in the noise of the hall, and Myrcella breathes out through her nose, prays that they cannot see how she trembles.

 

_And mine_ , she thinks, _you have my word, too_.

 

* * *

 

("Well, bless her missing ear," Theon says sardonically when Robb passes on the news that the sworn swords of Storm’s End are at their command, "I didn't think she had it in her."

 

"Her ear isn't entirely missing," Robb says distractedly, stoking the fire, as Greatjon Umber roars with laughter.

 

"I liked her well enough, boy, she's got a good head on her shoulders even if she's turning cloak on her own blood, all of those are more'n I can say for you, Greyjoy," he says, and Theon scowls.

 

"I didn't say I didn't like her," Theon says, "Only I'm surprised she managed to muster up the men of Storm's End looking quite so strikingly like her Lady mother as she does."

 

"The Storm Lords loved Renly Baratheon," Robb says, turning to look at Theon, "And Renly named Myrcella his heir. It is- this is good. Very good. As soon as Aegon Targaryen sets foot back on Westeros, we ride. I shall speak to the men tonight."

 

"And what then?" the Greatjon asks, "You still plan to give the throne to the Taragaryen boy?"

 

"The Taragaryen _King_ ," Robb says sharply, "I have made clear that we do not fight for possession of the Iron Throne, and it shall remain that way. My men know that we will bend the knee for a Targaryen King in the South, but he shall have no crown above the Neck. Once we free my sisters and Cersei Lannister is at last unhanded- I want nothing more than to return _home_ , but we cannot do that, not yet."

 

He shuts his eyes.

 

"Soon.")

 

* * *

 

 

Months pass. Fire descends upon the capital as winter creeps ever further south.

 

In the end, Joffrey dies at the arrow of a sniper, shot through the head of the green cloak he wore as he rode to escape as his people came under siege.

 

Varys falls prey to a motley crew of sellswords under the command of Tyrion Lannister, mysteriously returned to Westeros in time for the battle.

 

Cersei is captured by Theon and Robb Stark themselves, taken to the bowels of the castle and locked away beside her brother, until someone can bear to look at the pair of them long enough to bring them to trial.

 

Daenerys’ dragons round up terrified household staff and innumerable Westerlords and Ladies in the yard, and the Kings of the Iron Throne and the North watch in grim silence from the window in the Throne Room.

 

The Stark girls, however, are nowhere to be found.

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> There’s a companion piece of sorts- currently shuffling towards completion- which resolves the end (somewhat).


End file.
